Exotic & Erotic

That's the title of the newest Filati that's the subject of today's entry. It's full of great designs and even has a few fun overly-literal translations (and a few near misses). Let's get started...........


Fruit brights and pink seem to be the order of the day for spring/summer. And big/chunky yarns tend to dominate the designs. Take a peek at some of the new yarns in the line for the season (including one "......phantasy ribbon..")


We'll be carrying many/most of these, plus a few others (they don't show their silk blend, Riso, which is just smashing). When we saw these fun colors and textures back in December, I looked forward to their arrival. From what I understand from the distributor, the first wave of them has left California and should be here midweek to late in the week, with more coming as they arrive in the US.

Here's one exception to the chunky knits trend, however (in orange)


The caption is "Cannes or Campus" and the garment on the left is a dk gauge; the right, 2.5 sts/inch (their new yarn Soft Cotton, which is half cotton and half microfiber). Check the great Missoni-inspired design on the far left here in bright colors. FUN stuff.


The one on the left is Soft Cotton again, and on the right is one of the last fine-gauge knits in the book at 6 sts/inch (around a sport gauge). Nice detail on the neckline, too.


But my absolute favorite mistranslation in the entire book is the caption for the sweater on the left in this picture


The yarn is Leggero, which is their microfiber semi-chenille sort of yarn. Great color, easy knitting, and a fun side-to-side knit with a simple, off-the-shoulder look. But check out this caption


Aside from the obvious one that jumped off the page at me (the spelling of nekkline), check the sentence....."absolutely in: submarine style nekkline and square shape of the sixties". OOOOOooooooook. Submarine style neckline.............look at the picture. Could they mean.......boatneck??? It made me howl! Some things are NOT literal translations........though I guess they were called U-boats.

Fast forward to the next section, which features "Nature Look and Texas Style". Texans out there---does ANYONE down there dress like this?


Sorry, but standing in front of an old Chevy truck in a dry field does NOT resonate as "Texas" with me. But I think this picture just stole the show for me


Um..........interesting and cool coloring in the sweater, but check the boots. They look like rubber galoshes (I looked for the metal buckles up the side). German Texas Rancher's Wife........more fun in a desert scene


The caption for the right-most sweater mentions it being a ".........tunika line.......", so does that mean you can wear it gamblin' on the boats? And of course, the one on the right is a "......navel-free tank........." knitted in a minimum of time in a ribbon yarn.


Does the addition of a hat to an outfit make it a Texas Look? Even if it is knitted with a microfiber ribbon (India)?


If it is knitted in prairie colours, does that really give it a "trapper look" (verbatim from the text). I'm not sure about the ribbon with fur trim, but what do I know--I live in Indiana.

On the far right is a really cool multi-strand, multi-yarn top that will be a F-A-S-T knit (you hold three different yarns together to make it and use a 12mm needle--one of the yarns is Riso, a silk-blend ribbon).


And there's the bell-shaped sleeve again. Fun. And check the criss-cross neckline on the right, here.
This is at least the third spring/summer garment (all from different lines/companies) that includes a similar detail. There's a GREAT Dale of Norway design that has cables on an angle from the side seams to the neck and crossing, there's another, and this one. Does anyone else see a trend? More pinks for the season, too


The garment on the right uses Riso again, but again it's held with another yarn, so you don't get to see the true beauty of the tape/ribbon Riso knitted by itself. But the keyhole neckline is fun.

It's a great set of designs, with choices for everyone (even Texans) and 51 different projects for $9.95 retail. Two thumbs up from this reviewer.

Last, a "beauty shot" of the Mountain Colors Bearfoot that arrived Wednesday, amidst a flurry of new yarns. I've not knitted with this yarn .....YET....but I hear it is delightful in the hands.


We've got a new sock knitting class next week. Maybe my knit-along project should be something in Bearfoot. Hmmmmmmmmmmm.

Coming soon--shots of the new Dale yarns and model garments (four of 'em!) as well as pictures of the soy silk yarns (chenilles, tapes, bamboo, and ribbon) that dropped in. Probably one over the weekend and another on Monday (since Saturday looks to be hoppin' with some extra special visitors from Chicago coming this way). Today--a group of beginning knitting in the afternoon and another in the evening (same as yesterday--one in the daylight, one in the evening). We have over 20 folks currently taking beginning knitting here--and we thought the entire city already knitted!?!?!?!?

Source of Great Joy

The new spring Filati arrived today. I'll be showing it here very shortly (hopefully tonight or tomorrow--but I'm teaching beginning knitting four times in two days today/tomorrow)......but rest assured it's just packed full of wonderful overly-literal translations and fun misinterpretations. And some fun sweater projects.

Today's yarn-bomb included four large boxes of Manos del Uruguay (mmmmmmmmm, Manos) and a big box of Brown Sheep. Yesterday we received a HUGE box of hand-dyed lovelies from a company in Arizona (we just ordered it on Saturday!!) that uses soy silk fibers and hand-dyes them. I now have soy silk chenille, soy silk tape, and bamboo yarn all in lovely hand-dyed (according to a certain magazine that just came out that's actually han-dyed...who is Han and where does his family dye yarn??) shades...........I'll try to post pix here shortly.

Be well.............I miss our getting together!

More Norwegian Than I Can Handle

Yeah, right.........let my ex talk to you about that one..........but I'm talking about yarn. Our Dale of Norway arrives tomorrow (I expected it today and was wrong...stalk it with this 1zx539230340782065 through UPS). If you add up the amounts across the six boxes, that's about 210 pounds of Norwegian with my name on it. Mmmmmmmm. It does sound good when you put it that way, however.....(evil grin).

The end of the week was a full-on yarn orgy, as I mentioned below. Our most fantastic rep on the planet, Pam S, was here for awhile on Friday (from 4 p.m. until about 1:30 a.m.--seriously, she left at that hour to head back to her hotel). Then she came back on Saturday at about 2 p.m. and she and Matt wrapped up around 4 a.m.--yes, 4 in the morning. But the net result is a series of fantastic orders for a WIDE variety of yarns from several major manufacturers. She represents Cascade (which we order tons of already), Meunch/GGH (which we ordered deep and wide, for delivery between June and September), Great Adirondack (she worked with Matt and I have no idea what's coming--color and texture are his department) and several other lines. We'll have PLENTY of new yarns to stock that 10,000+ square feet of space, I'm convinced (no, we don't know where it is yet......hopefully soon). I'll recap what we ordered shortly, with pictures and more. We adore her and we learned sooooooo much from her. She is an amazing woman. And we hated to see her go.

With that, I'm outta here. Orders to pack, things to get ready for tonight's "Lifestyles Expo" at a local hotel (Matt's manning a booth there until the shop closes, when I'll join him). We have no idea what to expect, so...........here's to ????